


(welcome to the fallout)

by sleeplessmiles



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Blood, Everyone Supporting Jemma, Gen, Haircuts, Hurt/Comfort, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Recovery, Team Dynamics, post-3x02
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-11
Updated: 2015-10-11
Packaged: 2018-04-25 20:18:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4975111
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sleeplessmiles/pseuds/sleeplessmiles
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>So maybe it's not about how much it hurts when you fall down. Maybe there’s just a finite number of knocks people can withstand before it begins to wear away at their spirit. Maybe it's less about how long you stay down, and more about how you are when you climb to your feet.</em>
</p><p>  <em>Maybe, just maybe, it matters who you're willing to lean on in order to pick yourself back up again.<em></em></em></p><p>--</p><p>Post-3x02. May comes home. Jemma takes her first steps forward.</p><p>This is Day One.</p>
            </blockquote>





	(welcome to the fallout)

**Author's Note:**

> Anyone over the past few days: Hey, how's it going?  
> Me, grabbing their shoulders: JEMMA SIMMONS IS GETTING A PTSD RECOVERY ARC
> 
> The T rating (and blood tag) is because there's a section in here with a little blood - it's not intentional self-harm, just an accident, but there's a cut palm and a bit of bleeding as a result. I thought I'd chuck a warning in just to be safe. This also technically fills the prompt 'maysimmons + things you said that made me feel real' over on tumblr, so. Ta-da! The focus is clearly on MaySimmons here, but it's me, so there's a little bit of everything (and an underlying theme of Jemma + Everyone Loving Her Endlessly).
> 
> Hope you like it!!

 

 

When the phone rings again, not five minutes after May ends the call with Andrew, she knows exactly whose voice she’s going to hear filtering down the line. Truthfully, she’s a little surprised by it – she wouldn’t imagine he’d be capable of any thoughts outside of Jemma just yet.   

But she’s grateful. Of course she’s grateful.

Allowing herself another private smile, May answers the phone.

‘Fitz,’ she says.

At the greeting, Hunter turns to look at her; even across the room as he is, he lifts his beer and makes an obnoxious celebratory sound. Rolling her eyes good-naturedly, she turns her back to him.

‘Yeah, yeah – May! We got her. Jemma, she’s – ’ Fitz cuts himself off to make a sort of disbelieving coughing sound. ‘We got her.’

‘I heard,’ May tells him, sure that he’ll be able to hear her smile even through the phone. ‘How is she?’

‘She’s all clear: no infection or radiation, or – she’ll be alright.’

It’s all good news, of course, flooding her with a fresh wave of relief, but it’s not what she’s asking. 

‘But how _is_ she?’ May repeats. Fitz takes a moment to inhale deeply, and she briefly worries that he’s going to try and sugarcoat it. Her stomach drops a little.

But he surprises her.

‘I’m not sure yet,’ he answers. His voice is raw, gruff with honesty and a hint of exhaustion. May can’t even begin to imagine what the past few days have held for him, let alone the previous half-year, and he hadn’t even been the one taken by the rock.

How could Jemma be anything even remotely approaching okay?

‘She’s… she’s quiet. I think it was bad.’

_Yeah._

‘It’ll take time,’ May says, gentling her voice. ‘Are you with her?’

‘I was. Bobbi and Daisy are just helping her get, ah, cleaned up, so. Washing her hair and all that.’

 _Good_ , May thinks, with a twinge of surprise. She’s already letting people help her. That’s good. Very good.

Fitz clears his throat awkwardly.

‘I just wanted to… thank you. For, you know.’ He pauses uncomfortably, and it isn’t hard for May to picture his face, cringing as he tries to find the words. ‘Well, not thinking I was crazy, mostly.’

May feels a pang of guilt at that, at the reminder that she wasn’t there – that the only help she could give from afar was providing sources, suggesting historical experts who might be able to point Fitz in the right direction. Of course, she'd needed this time away from SHIELD, needed to get her head right again. But that doesn’t make this strange guilt lessen at all.

‘It wasn’t crazy of you. Just brave.’ She can almost imagine his lopsided smile at the compliment. ‘I’m glad I could help.’

‘Well, it sent me on a bit of a wild goose chase actually, a whole lot of dead-ends. But that’s the only way you rule them out, right?’ 

He’s interrupted then, the distinct sound of knuckles rapping on glass filtering down the line.

‘Oh! Ah, they’ve just finished up, so – ’ 

‘Go. Be with her.’ 

‘Yeah,’ Fitz laughs, awed and sounding completely flummoxed. May’s lips curve upwards once more. ‘Thanks, May. Take care of yourself, yeah?’

Once he disconnects, May lingers with the phone up to her face for a moment and contemplates her next move.

Because she’s back in the game now. William May’s daughter always climbs back to her feet, and she’s done that – albeit with unexpected company, this time. And this mission they’re about to embark on? It’s to protect her people, to keep those she loves safe.

But what if that’s not helpful to them right now? What if that’s not their most pressing need?

What if they need her there instead? 

(And really, for all the questions, she already knows the answer.) 

Chasing Ward... it can wait. It’s just -

It can wait.

Decided, she glances back over her shoulder to see what Lance is doing. True to form, he’s reclining perilously far back in a chair, legs thrown up on a table. He’s also sipping from a beer and singing the first few lines of _Drops of Jupiter_ to himself.

So. Just as she left him, really.

_‘Now that she’s back in the atmosphere with drops of Jupiter in her haa- ’_

‘Hunter,’ she calls out. He looks up expectantly, his expression open. This time, she doesn't bother to hide the smirk creeping across her face.

‘We’re making a detour.’

 

 

-

-

 

 

‘Did Fitz mention how she’s doing?’ Hunter asks abruptly, breaking the silence some time around the early hours of the morning. May doesn’t look across at him, only tightens her fingers around the steering wheel.

‘Not so much,’ she replies. ‘Said she’s quiet.’

He lets out a low whistle. ‘Can’t be easy. I know blokes who were isolated in enemy territory not even half as long as she’s been gone. They took it _hard_. Course, you and I are no strangers to that, now, are we?’

And May doesn’t know much about Lance Hunter’s time in the SAS, but perhaps the sudden darkness lingering behind his eyes is all she really needs to know.

She steps down harder on the accelerator.

 

 

-

-

 

 

It’s the early the next morning by the time they arrive back at the Playground, Bobbi waiting in the garage to greet them as they pull the car in. She makes a big show of giving Hunter hell for being back so soon, but May can hear the gratitude behind her words, can see it in the way the two of them embrace a little longer than Bobbi would normally allow. And when Bobbi pulls back, when the two women make eye contact and Bobbi gives a little smile, May can see the gratitude there, too.

She knows it already.

This is the right decision.

Bobbi leads them through the base towards the med bay after that, explaining the situation as she goes, and May takes the opportunity to observe her movement – she’d been in a hospital bed last time they’d seen each other, after all, her leg in a heavy brace. She’s pleased to see the other woman moving remarkably well, with barely even a hitch to her step. There’s clearly still some mobility issues, but she’s also clearly not letting them hinder her too much. Plus the knee brace she’s wearing seems to be doing wonders, the design unlike anything May’s ever seen, and she doesn’t even need to ask to know that it’s a creation of Fitz’s.

A contented smile hints at May’s lips; recovery has happened here in her absence.

_Good. This is good._

(And maybe, if she repeats it to herself enough, May will start to believe it. Maybe, just maybe, she won’t be as heartbroken by the damaged girl awaiting her on this morning.)

Bobbi slows her pace as they draw near to the med bay.

‘Just… make sure you knock first, okay?’ She narrows her eyes, as though assessing that they get it. ‘If she’s up for company, they’ll let you know.’

There’s no need for clarification on who “they” are.

Sure enough, when they round the last corner before the med bay, it’s to find Skye – no, Daisy, it’s to find _Daisy_ – sitting on the ground, her back to the door. When she sees them coming, she scrambles to her feet.

‘Fitz is still in there. She keeps falling asleep on him.’

‘Shouldn’t you be in bed?’ Bobbi accuses.

‘Shouldn’t _you_?’ Daisy counters automatically.

‘Yesterday was pretty rough on you, Daisy. You need your rest too.’

But Daisy isn’t listening; she’s shifted her gaze across to May. Raising an eyebrow, she folds her arms across her chest and juts out a hip.

‘May. Long time, no see.’

May says nothing, intent on waiting out the girl’s reaction. She'd needed to leave SHIELD, and she doesn't regret it, but just like when she was talking to Fitz earlier, May can't help but feel a small twinge of guilt. What must these people have suffered through in the past few months?

Finally, Daisy softens, pulling her lips up into something approaching an accepting expression.

‘I’m glad you’re back,’ she utters quietly. May feels a knot of tension in her neck loosen at the admission, one she hadn’t even been previously aware existed. She exhales.

‘Me too.’ 

Daisy steps to the side and gestures at the door, so May reaches out and knocks. 

‘What?’ Lance is saying. ‘Nothing for me? What am I to you people?’

Daisy snorts. ‘You’re kidding, right? You’ve been gone like three hours.’

‘So?’

‘ _So,_ I was actually happy about it.’

As May waits for a response from the room, the familiarity of the bickering washing over her, she realises that she isn’t really sure what she’s expecting here. Jumpiness, maybe. Exhaustion definitely. Fitz hadn’t mentioned her state of nutrition over the phone, and this is _Jemma_ – she’s resourceful, so much so that she was able to survive for six whole months – so she surely found some source of food. Even so, she must be substantially thinner than she’d been previously.

So she doesn’t really know what to expect.

‘Yeah, you can come in,’ Fitz’s voice calls out eventually. Sparing a quick glance for the others – they’ve fallen silent at the sound of his voice – May pushes open the door.

Jemma sits on the bed, her legs folded neatly beneath her, and she has one side pressed against Fitz's. Even though her hands are folded in her lap, even though her posture seems controlled, it's clear that the contact with his torso is tethering her - she seems to strain unconsciously towards it, even leaning into it.

She looks tired, May thinks. She looks bedraggled. She looks pale, with the darkness of her hair and brows cutting a stark contrast to her skin and the bleached white walls of the room.

She looks…

Small.

It’s not just the clothes ( _Bobbi's?_ ) that she’s practically swimming in, either – Jemma’s just always seemed to be bigger than her slight build would suggest. Not in the same larger-than-life way Daisy has, with that endless, contagious energy exuding from her. No, Jemma’s has always been more of a softness, emanating gently and caressing those around her with a quiet, unassuming love.  

She still has it – of this, May is certain. She isn’t sure there’s anything that could strip her of it entirely. It’s just that it's clearly more contained right now, the girl lacking the energy to do much of anything except look after herself.

And that’s okay.

It’s more than okay.

She climbs to her feet, watching May warily for a moment, but May barely has time to begin properly documenting the changes in her appearance before Jemma’s stepping forward and wrapping her up in a tight hug. She fully expects the girl to stagger backwards within seconds, so what actually happens shocks her:

Jemma _clings_.

Jemma Simmons doesn’t cling. She seeks physical contact for comfort; May has always known that, has seen how she is about encouraging arm squeezes and the like. But regardless of how much she needs it, she rarely initiates it anymore. Even though things have clearly gotten more difficult over the past few years, she’s become even less inclined to “impose” herself on people. In fact, since the pod, the only time May’s seen her take the physical comfort that she requires had been when May herself returned from the ship, during the short-lived SHIELD coup, and even then, the hug had been fleeting. It had almost been as though Jemma felt bad for even needing reassurance in the first place.

So this, here? This is entirely different. This is new.

This is a Jemma Simmons unafraid of seeking what she needs.

And for all that things are broken, for all that the scattered pieces need to be accounted for, May is hit with an overwhelming sense of relief. 

(It's easier to help keep her demons at bay if they don't have to fight her in the process, after all.)

May hesitates for a few moments, the familiar sense of discomfort radiating out from her spine, before she tentatively brings her arms up. Then she's hugging the girl back, and maybe her grip nowhere near as tight and desperate as Jemma's, but really, it feels just as grateful. Her arms are loosely draped around Jemma’s waist, so it’s mostly just a coincidence that her hands are at the small of Jemma’s back.

Feeling something abnormal beneath her right hand, she freezes.

There’s… something tucked away there.

In May’s arms, Jemma stiffens all of a sudden. May barely notices though, mind reeling as it is. 

That’s where she’d taught Jemma to conceal a firearm. Before the girl embarked for Hydra, when May had been hurriedly giving her a crash course in self-defense, she’d shown Jemma how the curve of her spine can be an ideal place to hide a weapon without detection. Tuck it into your waistband, wear a loose-fitting shirt or jacket over the top. Easy.

The terrible understanding sinks in now, settling into May’s very bones with a heavy sense of dread.

 _She’s got a weapon._  

Jemma steps awkwardly out of May’s embrace, her eyes going straight to May’s in evaluation. Her guarded gaze is flinty, defiant, and she juts her chin out as though challenging May to mention it. She’s not ashamed at all, May realises. Perhaps a little uncomfortable with being caught out, but she’s otherwise unapologetic.

 _What happened to you?_  May wants to ask, deathly afraid of the answer. _What has made you so afraid to sit unarmed amongst friends?_  

She feels a little sick.

She feels, absurdly, like pulling Jemma in for another hug.

But then: 

‘Thought you’d abdicated the throne for a while there, princess.’ 

(And, for the first time on record, Melinda May might actually be grateful for Lance Hunter’s presence in a room.)

Breaking eye contact and tilting her head to the side, Jemma’s mouth twitches – not a smile, but it’s as though the muscles are trying to remember, straining towards the ghost of what she was. It’s promising. It’s something. 

‘Hello, Lance,’ she mumbles. Her voice is a little croaky, a little unsure, but it’s there.

May thinks that might just be everything.

Astonishment passes across Hunter’s face at the realisation that he's prompted her to speak, but he doesn't look smug like May might have expected from him months ago. Instead, he just looks proud of her, giving Jemma a soft, pleased grin. May assumes that’ll be the extent of the girl's greeting – Hunter does too, clearly – but then, Jemma surprises them again.

She steps hesitantly into his space, raising her arms.

To Hunter’s eternal credit, he doesn’t let his surprise show; he simply pulls her into the hug she’s requesting. The hug is much tighter, and May watches as his hands remain up by her shoulder blades.

‘Welcome back,’ he mumbles into her hair, his blinking becoming suspiciously rapid. Jemma only seems to hold on tighter.

Averting her eyes, May glances across at Fitz and raises an eyebrow - _are you seeing this?_ He nods, and his face is faintly drawn with worry but there’s also pride shining there. 

She understands it completely.

Jemma Simmons, unafraid of imposing herself upon other people. Who’d have thought?

(And maybe if she focuses enough on that, she won’t have to contemplate the other truth: Jemma Simmons, standing in a room full of loved ones with a concealed dagger on her person.)

 

 

-

-

 

 

There’s something else there, though, something else outside of the obvious clinginess. Outside of Jemma seeking out points of contact, instinctively gravitating towards the warmth of others as though their very pulses sing out to her. There's something else.

May doesn’t notice it at first.

She notices the quiet; the girl is very obviously more subdued than she used to be. May doesn’t think it’s an issue with forming sentences so much as it is with the timing, the speed of conversation. It’s completely understandable, and something that will most likely (hopefully) come back in bits and pieces, with time.

It takes her a little longer to decipher the other issue, to explain the vague uneasiness hanging in the air. 

But she does. Eventually, she does.

Jemma’s issue is with movement.

Anytime something or someone moves around her, even distantly becoming picked up in the range of her peripheral vision, it spooks her. She flinches, each and every time. It’s not difficult for May to extrapolate, even without knowing the full extent of the girl’s experience - clearly, company has spelled nothing but harm for quite some time. Anything that moves in her vicinity is something her body instantly recognises as a threat, even if she logically understands this to be false. She can’t help it; it’s instinctive.

Jemma Simmons' instincts are screaming at her to defend herself, to _fight_.

(The knife makes a lot more sense, suddenly.)

But even despite her fear, even despite everything within her chanting of impending danger, Jemma still reaches out. She still rallies against her reflexes to connect with the people around her.

And that's how May realises what she must do. 

Between the two of them, they've always balanced each other out pretty well. Jemma's chattiness makes up for May's shortness of words; Jemma's comforting touches are few and far between, ever-conscious of May's aversion to contact. But now, the balance is off. And May knows that in order to bridge that gap, she's going to need to overcompensate. She needs to somehow provide the human voice Jemma so sorely seeks, and she needs to reach out.

 _She_ needs to be the one to reach out.

It will be horrendously difficult to navigate, battling Jemma’s reflexes and May’s own shortcomings, but it’s necessary.

Jemma needs it.

And really, to Melinda May, that’s all that matters.

 

 

-

-

 

 

After doing the necessary rounds of the base, greeting various members of the team and checking in with Coulson, May returns to a med bay worryingly devoid of Jemma. Instead, she finds Fitz and Bobbi – the former pacing, wringing his hands agitatedly, while the latter leans against the wall and watches him with a hawk-like gaze. As May enters, they both look up, only for their faces to instantly fall.

_Oh no._

‘Where’s Jemma?’ May asks, almost afraid of the answer at this point. Bobbi breathes out a defeated sigh, guilt radiating from her. Fitz continues to look distressed, all tension and uncontrolled movement.

‘Getting a cup of tea,’ he grits out.

May’s eyebrows creep upwards. ‘Alone?’

‘It’s just down the hallway,’ Bobbi reasons. It sounds like something she’s been repeating, trying to convince them both. ‘All the lights are dimmed. Plus there’s no one else around; we had this wing cleared out last night.’

‘She wanted to do it alone,’ Fitz says simply, eyes locking onto May’s all of a sudden, and the urgency in his gaze speaks volumes. 

 _She wanted to push herself. She wanted to test her limits._  

Of course she did.

May sighs, changing tack. ‘You two know about the knife she’s got?’

The shadows that immediately cross both of their faces are answer enough.

‘It’s really more of a shiv,’ Bobbi provides, grimacing. 

Homemade then.

_God, Jemma. What did they do to you?_

‘Okay.’ May presses her lips together, thinking. Jemma clearly wanted to try this on her own, and so Bobbi or Fitz checking up on her might dampen her confidence. But there’s no reason for her to believe that May’s aware of this solo mission.

She nods, decided.

‘I can go check on her. I wasn’t here when she said she’d go alone.’

Bobbi and Fitz glance at each other, communicating something with their eyes, before they both turn to her and nod their agreement, twin expressions of grimness on their faces. May turns to leave, but she’s halfway out the door when her brain catches up with what she’d seen – or, more specifically, it catches up with how bone-tired Fitz looks all of a sudden.

So she stops herself. Turns back around.

Pins Fitz with a critical stare.

(She’s got a bit to make up for, after all.)

‘You okay?’

Bobbi’s watching him too now, scrutinising his face, and something about the other woman’s concern pulls at May’s heartstrings. But Fitz only rubs at an eye with the heel of one palm. 

‘Rough night,’ he mutters, and May thinks she can probably guess at just _how_ rough from the haunted look behind his eyes.

‘There’s going to be a lot of those.’ 

‘I know.’

But his face is resolved as he says it, determined. May glances across at Bobbi to find a similar expression there.

 _Good._  

Giving them a small quirk of her lips – not quite a smile, but perhaps the intent of one – May leaves to find Jemma.

 

 

-

-

 

 

May finds her in the small kitchenette near the med bay, exactly as promised. To her relief, everything seems to be blessedly normal. With her back to the doorway, Jemma doesn’t even notice that she’s got company, which allows May to observe her in silence for a moment.

It’s… 

It helps.

Because really, save for the past six months, this could be any moment over the past few years – Jemma losing herself in the simple routine, the simple pleasure of fixing herself a nice cup of tea. The image is so startlingly _normal_ that May finds herself smiling, entirely without her permission.

Jemma finishes making the tea, then, depositing the used tea bag and clearing off the bench, and yet she doesn’t bring the cup to her lips. She only stares down at the freshly-made cup, shoulders not tense but not quite _not_ tense, either. May can’t see her face, so she doesn’t know whether she’s smiling, or frowning, or – she just can’t read her.

The thought is troubling.

She reaches up to the cupboard for another mug, clearly intent on making a second cup, and May thinks this might be a good opportunity to announce her presence – loud enough to avoid setting her on edge, but quiet enough to not surprise her. It’s a fine line to walk. And really, she doesn’t even know what to say. _Mind if I join you?_ maybe, or _making another cup?_

Every option sounds awkward. All May knows is that she needs to fill that gap, that silence, for Jemma.

But even with all of that forethought, she still makes one unforgivable error; she forgets her footfalls.

She steps into the kitchen too quietly.

Whether her time on the alien planet has heightened her senses, or whether she’s just become overly sensitive to noise in general, May doesn’t know. What she _does_ know is that Jemma hears the slightest squeak of a boot on the floor and startles violently. The mug shatters in her hand.

Almost faster than May can blink, Jemma whirls around with a large shard of porcelain clenched in her fist, brandishing it in May’s direction.

_No._

Jemma’s eyes are wide, startled - hunted - and May knows the expression all too well. It’s the face of a girl who has spent so long running, so long fleeing, only to find that it’s all caught up to her anyway.

But more importantly right now, it’s the face of someone completely unaware of her surroundings. 

_She’s reliving it._

Her heart hammering in her chest, May takes a step closer, hands out in a calming gesture. Jemma only holds the shard up higher, more aggressively, and May has no doubt that she knows exactly what to do with it. Exactly where to hit to deal a killing blow. 

She’ll need to tread carefully.

‘It’s okay. Jemma,' she murmurs. 'It’s just me. It’s May.’

Jemma is silent but for her heavy breathing, the sharp raggedness of it tearing May to pieces. Every few breaths, an aborted whimper comes out, soundtracking this horrible situation with her quiet agony. She’s holding the porcelain tight enough to turn her knuckles white; it cuts into her palm, blood seeping out from between her knuckles.

_No no no –_

‘Jemma,’ May repeats, more desperation in her voice. ‘It’s okay. It’s May, see?’ She holds her hands up a little higher, but makes no further move to approach. There’s blood dripping down Jemma’s wrist now, a sinister bracelet creeping down her forearm.

_Shit._

‘You’re – you’re at the Playground. You’re back home.’ 

Jemma blinks rapidly, the wildness on her face faltering a little, and her sharp eyes dart around. She seems to be genuinely assessing her surrounds.

_Good. That’s my girl._

‘Jemma.’ Her eyes hone in on May’s face again. There’s more recognition than there was before. It's an improvement. May swallows. ‘You’re safe; I promise you. You’re _safe_.’ 

Jemma blinks sluggishly, lips twitching, and her eyes seem to be _seeing_ again.

She’s coming back. 

 _Come on. You’ve got this._  

‘You with me?’ May asks gently.

And that’s when Jemma notices the blood. 

Dropping the shard, she instantly cradles her injured hand in her uninjured one, horror in her fixed gaze. She releases an agonised gasp, filled with pain and yet still so quiet, so carefully hushed. May swears that her heart is breaking at the sound. How quiet has she learned to be? What alien horrors have necessitated such a thing? 

(The worst part, May knows, is that it wouldn’t have even been much of stretch for this girl. She has borne her pain in silence for so long now, long before this entire ordeal. Is the source of the pain even relevant?)

Her hand is balled into a fist, and she’s looking around frantically, searching for – for what, Jemma? What do you need? She settles for wrapping it in her shirt, whimpering quietly in abject fear. Her hand is clutched tightly against her abdomen, eyes still darting around as she presses the wound even tighter, and with a sickening jolt of understanding May realises that she’s not just trying to stop the bleeding.

God. 

_She’s trying to mask it._

Unable to keep her distance any longer, May approaches. Wild eyes flick up to meet hers.

‘Let me see,’ May probes gently, gesturing for the hand. Jemma’s biting her lip almost hard enough to draw even more blood. Her eyes regard May dully.

 _God._  

‘Jemma,’ May breathes. 

There’s an agonisingly long moment where Jemma’s eyes simply bore into May’s, each passing second making May more fearful for the endpoint of this.

And then, Jemma nods.

Once.

It’s enough. 

Slowly, reluctantly, she uncurls her fingers from the fist they’d been clenched into, revealing the cut. May winces; the soft skin of her palm is dotted with calluses, yet this cut seems to have intersected the soft, fleshy part. Similarly, it’s cut into the soft undersides of her knuckles, causing angry red swelling to have sprung up already.

The injury practically screams _blind panic._ May’s chest aches with an ancient heaviness at the sight.

Reaching out as tentatively as possible, she waits for Jemma to spook or back out. But the girl does nothing of the sort: she watches May warily, yet she makes no move to stop her.

_Good. That’s it._

Once she has the injured hand resting between her own hands, she looks back up to meet Jemma’s eye.

‘Is this okay?’ she asks. Jemma hesitates, nods again. Some of the tension seems to be slowly leeching from her body, and while May knows it’s a good sign, she also knows that Jemma’s energy must be leaving her too. The comedown is never easy. She’ll have to work quickly.

She turns her attention to Jemma’s hand in hers; so small and delicate, and yet covered with evidence of such hardness. For her knuckles are grazed, now, the macabre streaks marring her pale skin with their cruelty. Although some of the gashes are fresh, there are marks in various stages of healing there, speaking to untold grievous encounters.

The healer, forced to destroy. 

May swallows, focuses instead on the fresh cut. 

( _Triage, Melinda. First, treat the things you actually can._ )

‘Not deep enough for stitches, which is good,’ she decides eventually. She releases the hand, watching as Jemma instinctively curls her fingers into a fist against her abdomen again. It hurts her heart. ‘But we still need to wrap it.’

The girl looks at her with wide, guilty eyes, and an apology is on her lips – May can practically _hear_ it – but it never spills forth, waiting there as though frozen.

(Clinging to her. The same way Jemma clings to everyone else now, clings to this life.)

Tears begin to fill her eyes alarmingly fast.

‘It’s okay,’ May says. It rings hollow, even to her own ears. Jemma’s eyes flutter shut, a pained expression taking over her face, and it seems she’s making a conscious effort to unclench her jaw when she opens her eyes again.

Her gaze is fixed on the floor.

‘Can you get Fitz?’ she whispers, almost guiltily.

May nods. ‘Okay. Sure. We can go to him.’ She glances down at Jemma’s shirt – at the dark red patch there, the frenzied smears. There’s no way Fitz is going to react well to this, even if he _is_ trying to subdue his reaction (as May knows he will). So she bends her knees a little, ducking to make eye contact with Jemma. 

‘Do you want to get cleaned up first?’

Jemma shakes her head, lower lip trembling. ‘I just…’

‘Yeah. Fitz,’ May murmurs. ‘Okay. That’s okay.’ 

She hesitates only briefly before slinging an arm over Jemma’s shoulders, bringing the girl in close to her side.

(Jemma leans into the contact instinctively.)

 

 

-

-

 

 

After leaving Jemma in Bobbi’s more than capable hands, with Fitz hovering close nearby, May returns to the kitchen to clean up the mess. She takes her time with it: meticulously collecting the fragments off the counter top, before turning to the pieces that litter the floor and proceeding to do the same. The mug filled with tea had toppled too, in the confusion, and it’s this one that May ponders now. It had seemed like such a positive step in recovery at the time, small though it may be. Instead, it’s been shattered into innumerable shards, too many to piece back together into what it once was.

But you could still do it, couldn’t you? You could still take the pieces that remain, jagged though they are, and rejoin them to one another. Perhaps the container at the end wouldn’t resemble a mug, but if it still holds liquid, what does it matter?

What does it matter?

She’s just finished wiping the sloshed tea off the ground and is wringing out the cloth in the sink, scanning the countertop for blood, when she hears someone enter the kitchen behind her. She doesn’t need to turn around, doesn’t need to check who’s there.

May would know those footfalls anywhere.

But Andrew says nothing, simply waiting her out in silence. Despite herself, May’s hands still at their task; she doesn’t really want to give voice to her fears just yet, doesn’t want to make her shortcomings more real. 

She does anyway.

‘I don’t know how to fix this,’ she murmurs, fingers tightening on the countertop. Her eyelids flutter shut at the admission, because it’s real now, isn’t it? That hard-to-place tingle of guilt has a voice, a name.

A home.

And it’s not that Jemma needs fixing, exactly. Her pieces simply need to be rejoined, even if they’re in a different order to before. It's just that May doesn’t know _how_ to help pick up the pieces, doesn't even know where to begin; the fragments seem to keep falling through her fingers, no matter how hard she tries to hold them all.

(She’d _known_ that Jemma startles easily. How had she not taken more care to avoid it? How could she have been responsible for further fracturing?)

Andrew is quiet for the longest time, with the steady hum of the fridge the only sound in the small kitchen. May doesn’t dare to chance a look at his face. Then, eventually, he sighs.

‘Maybe she doesn’t need you to fix it,’ he suggests, voice hoarse from the protracted silence. ‘Maybe, she just needs you to be there until she can fix it herself.’

She turns around to meet his gaze.

‘You’ll help her? When she’s ready?’

He smiles, his expression heavy with comprehension. Behind his eyes is the ghost of every moment they’d shared after Bahrain, every determined effort he’d made to do right by her.

He’d always been there before. So May knows his answer even before he says it.

‘Of course.’

 

 

-

-

 

  

(May’s been thinking a lot about what her father said about figure-skating. It hurt less as a kid, she’d insisted at the time, but she’s starting to think that maybe that’s not quite right. Because the woman who returned from Bahrain? She wasn’t any less William May’s daughter. It had taken her a while to pick herself up off the ice, longer than it would usually take, but she’d still done it.

So maybe it's not about how much it hurts when you fall down. Maybe there’s just a finite number of knocks people can withstand before it begins to wear away at their spirit. Maybe it's less about how long you stay down, and more about how you are when you climb to your feet.

Maybe, just maybe, it matters who you're willing to lean on in order to pick yourself back up again.)

 

 

-

-

 

 

When May returns to the med bay, it’s to find Jemma pressed sleepily into Fitz’s side as he and Bobbi chatter away, bickering over everything and nothing. Her freshly bandaged hand is nestled in her lap, and while she doesn’t appear to be actively contributing to the conversation, her face shows nothing but a quiet contentment at the proceedings. She’s simply letting the voices wash over her in a steady flow. May wouldn’t even be surprised to learn that she hasn’t absorbed a single word.

 _So long without hearing another human voice_. 

Eventually, when conversation peters out somewhat, Jemma sits up and clears her throat.

‘I’d like to take a shower, I think.’ 

Fitz starts nodding, enthusiastic. Perhaps too enthusiastic, May muses, although she can see why: aside from the tea incident, it seems to be the first request she’s made without first being asked. And considering what had eventuated last time she’d made a request, it’s pretty impressive that she’s so willing to try again so soon.

So, yeah. She gets the enthusiasm.

_(Get knocked to the ice, you get back up.)_

‘Yeah, of course,’ he says, gentle in a way May’s never really seen from him before. ‘Ah, yeah. We can get you some of your old clothes…?’

She grimaces, surprisingly delicate. ‘I don’t really have any… loose pants.’

‘Well we’re gonna have to get you _something_ ,’ Bobbi chips in, grinning crookedly. ‘No offence, but my pants look like they’re trying to eat you. Unless that’s the look you’re going for.’

They all pause for a moment to eye her current pants situation, with the cuffs of her sweatpants rolled up several times just so that she can walk.

‘Take some of mine,’ May offers. ‘We’re close enough in size. I can find you something loose.’ 

Jemma meets her eyes, gratitude shining from her gaze.

‘Will – do you need any help, do you think?’ Fitz asks.

She hesitates, and May’s speaking again before she even realises.

‘I can wait outside. By the door.’ The _so that no one can get in_ is unspoken, implicit in the promise.

(This time, Jemma’s gaze is all raw relief.)

‘Thank you,’ she answers softly.

They make their arrangements, grabbing her toiletries and clothes and making sure to smuggle her into the nicest bathroom on the base. May waits outside the door, a watchful sentinel, and although she can’t see them, she knows both Bobbi and Fitz must be hovering nearby, given how anxious they'd been to leave Jemma. The water’s been running for some time now – and really, considering how long the girl's been without a shower, May imagines it’ll be running for some time longer.

So. All things considered, the whole operation seems to be running fairly smoothly.

That is, until an almighty clatter sounds from within the bathroom, followed by an audibly sharp inhalation. May stiffens, instantly on high alert.

_Shit._

‘Jemma?’ she calls out. There’s a gentle whimper on the other side of the door. May firms her lips in worry. ‘Jemma, can you talk to me?’

Silence. 

Then, there’s the sound of Jemma clearing her throat a bit, whispering something. The roar of the shower water is too loud, though, so May can’t really make it out. She shakes her head, gritting her teeth.

‘What? I’m – I can’t hear you. I’m sorry.’

There’s more mumbling, a sniff. May shakes her head again.

‘Jemma, I’m going to come in now. Can you unlock the door for me?’

Silence.

More silence.

Then, finally, the door unlocks.

Entering slowly so as to not startle her further, May takes stock of the situation as best she can. The door shuts behind her with a click. 

It's not great.

Jemma looks distraught, her eyes red and puffy and her skin deathly pale. Her hair is still wet and uncombed from the shower, and she wears nothing more than a bra and underwear ( _God_ , look at her ribs) but she doesn't seem at all affected by this. After having let May in, she’s backed away and curled up on the floor, leaning back against the wall – ostensibly where she’d been before, although May’s trying not to think about it – and in her bandaged hand –

May’s stomach drops.

Yeah. There’s the shiv.

There are toiletries strewn all across the floor in front of where she sits, too. May isn’t sure what Jemma was searching for, or whether she was even looking for anything at all, but the odds and ends all over the place suggest the search was a frantic one. On top of it all, the shower water’s still running steadily in the background, despite Jemma no longer being under the spray. _That_ gives May cause to inhale softly, unable to mask her concern.

(Jemma hasn’t been great with water since the pod. What if this has triggered something now, in addition to all she’s endured since?)

Pushing it from her mind for the time being, May turns back to Jemma. She lowers the toilet lid and sits down, facing her; the girl’s hands are at the back of her neck, pinning her damp hair against the skin there. A shuddering inhale precedes her words.

‘I can’t…’ 

Her eyes lock onto May’s suddenly, and the empty desperation swirling within their depths is cutting.

‘I can’t wash it out?’ she whispers, forehead creasing with the illogicality of it. May feels something tight clench in her chest.

_Oh, no._

Because May’s been here herself, hasn’t she? She’d spent hours under the steady pelt of water’s stream, pressure up high enough to hurt her skin, in the hopes that some of it might be washed away.

It didn’t help. 

It never really does.

Jemma is shaking her head now, over and over, and even though there are tears streaming down her face, she barely makes a sound. 

‘I can’t wash it out. I… I _can’t_ – ’ 

‘It’s okay.’ 

‘I just wanted to…’

‘I know.’

Jemma blinks up at May through her tears, eyes wide and pained. Then, shoulders sagging, she pitches forward, resting her forehead onto May’s shin.

_God._

Every part of her aching for this girl, May reaches a hand out slowly, tentatively, to pat Jemma’s head in comfort. When she doesn’t shy away, May does it again and again, smoothing out the girl’s hair as she weeps her silent tears.

It’s about five minutes before May hears the shiv clatter to the floor.

 

 

-

-

 

 

At long last, it appears she’s cried herself out – or, well. For the time being, at any rate. There will be more tears, May knows, and not always in episodes like this. Sometimes, they leak out when you least expect them. Other times, they explode forth.

There will be more tears. But there will be more smiles, too, and that is no small comfort.

(It's only day one.)

Jemma has turned her head at some point, resting her cheek on May’s leg instead. She’s just staring into space, not making any particular move towards doing anything, and so May offers the only thing she can think of right now. 

‘Do you want me to try?’

Lifting her head, Jemma blinks up at May. 

‘Your hair,’ she clarifies. ‘I can wash it, if you’d like.’ 

She knows it's not what the girl had been talking about, before. She knows it can't cleanse her otherworldly experience.

But, with a bit of luck, it might just make her feel more human.

Jemma chews on her lower lip, nervous. ‘I… would you? I mean, if it’s not…’

‘Of course,’ May says. She raises her eyebrows. ‘So that’s a yes?’ 

Thankfully, Jemma nods.

‘Okay. Wait here.’

Ducking quickly out to the mess hall, May locates a suitable chair and hurries back. She runs through the logistics of the whole thing in her head as she returns, trying to offset the concern she feels at having left Jemma alone. As it turns out, however, she needn’t have worried at all.

Because in her absence, Jemma’s managed to collect all of the spilled toiletries, packaging them back up into the little bag. May feels warmth blossom in her chest. 

(If they _both_ hold the fragments, if they share the load, they can do this.)

She doesn’t really know how they’re going to work this, truthfully – not without making the girl stand in the shower again. Since she’s not particularly comfortable with that, she compromises, seating Jemma on the chair in front of the mirror and using the detachable nozzle on the washbasin’s tap. There’s a towel kind of draped across Jemma’s shoulders in an attempt to avoid leaning her over the sink, but water still spills onto the floor in places, pooling in various spots all over the bathroom.

It’s just…

The whole thing is a mess, basically. It’s messier than it has any right to be. But despite all of that, Jemma doesn’t seem to mind. She could probably do with a little controlled mess, May supposes, but that isn’t important just now.

What’s important is that May takes her time washing out the girl’s hair, hands infused with a gentleness she hadn’t been aware she’d possessed anymore.

What’s important is that Jemma feels cared for – finally, _finally_ cared for.

Once the bulk of the washing has been done, Jemma gets herself dressed as May attempts to mop up the disaster she's created all over the floor. Once Jemma's settled back in the seat once more, May sets to work on taming her hair. She’s just finished combing all the knots out, vastly enjoying the awed expression on the girl’s face at the foreign sensation, when something seems to change in the air. Pursing her (vaguely trembling) lips together, Jemma reaches out for the toiletries bag and pulls out – 

Scissors.

That’s a pair of scissors.

May worries for a moment, afraid she’s being introduced to Shiv 2.0, until she looks up to the mirror and sees the question on Jemma’s face. And then, she immediately understands. 

(It’s a far cry from the girl who’d stood before her 18 months earlier, tears in her eyes and hair cropped unevenly, asking for May to help fix it. She’d told Jemma then that the new haircut made her look like Peggy Carter. 

She wonders how far this girl’s heroes seem from her now.)

‘Please,’ Jemma says on a soft exhalation, refusing to look up at May. Her gaze remains fixed upon the scissors. ‘I want to feel…’

She never finishes the sentence, and May can’t decide whether it's because she can’t find the right word, or whether it’s just that she’d arrived at her intended meaning anyway.

_I want to feel._

So May reaches out to pick up the scissors. 

‘Of course,’ she says.

Something seems to flicker behind Jemma’s eyes – gratitude, perhaps, or just a dull sort of acceptance. She presses her lips together, tensing her jaw, and May feels something clench in her chest again. 

This girl is readying herself. Readying herself for battle.

May’s overcome with a sudden wave of doubt, before she reminds herself that Jemma wants this. What’s important is what Jemma wants. And she isn’t really sure that Jemma should be making any substantial decisions right now, but then again, maybe this is the perfect time for big decisions.

For _any_ decisions.

Because she has the luxury of that, now. Decisions that aren’t directly related to her ongoing survival. 

(She has that now.)

Taking a calm, measured breath in, May runs her hands through Jemma’s hair, bunching it up and bringing it in front of the girl’s shoulders so that they can both ponder the length of it. 

‘Like before?’ she asks.

And she can see it, can see how much Jemma wants to say _yes_ , how tempted she is to return to how she was, and yet it doesn’t feel quite right, does it? She’s changed, and going back seems disingenuous. The girl opens her mouth but the words stick in her throat again, so May decides to give her an out. She meets her eyes in the mirror and offers a small smile. 

‘I could make it a little shorter than before, maybe put a few more layers in? If you’d like.’

Something darkens on Jemma’s face, and she shakes her head just the slightest amount. 

‘Could we… keep it long? Just…’ She blinks sluggishly, her forehead creasing, before blowing out a breath. ‘Enough for me to tie back.’

Of course. Of course she’d want to keep it out of her face. How else to stop it from falling in her eyes, or from becoming swept up in the breeze unexpectedly? How else to stop her from being startled by her own hair?

_Of course._

It’s so practical, so very Jemma, and May feels a rush of affection for this endlessly resilient girl sitting before her. 

‘I’ll just crop a bit off the ends, then. That sound okay?’

She doesn’t reply, but there’s thankfulness behind her expression. That’s answer enough.

May works in silence for a little bit, taking extra long to comb out Jemma’s hair once more. The girl’s eyes close – not in bliss, but something like relief – so it’s possible she spends a little more time on it than is strictly necessary. After a while, though, the lack of conversation becomes heavy, more stifling. And with all that has transpired today, this is perhaps the clearest example of how May can restore this balance between them.

Because yes, she doesn’t mind the quiet herself, and yes, she and Jemma have spent many moments in mutually comfortable silence, but that was before, wasn’t it? She thinks back to Jemma’s face in the med bay, when she'd allowed the conversation to wash over her with a sort of neediness May hasn’t really seen from her before today. It must be so very grounding to her.

And if that’s what Jemma needs, even from someone as generally laconic as May, then that’s what Jemma will get. 

‘I used to figure skate,’ May begins, apropos of nothing. She hadn’t even known those particular words would come out, actually, but she’s glad that they did. Jemma blinks a couple of times, and May isn’t sure whether it’s what she said, or more the fact that it’s another human voice – a familiar human voice – breaking the silence. But something about it has Jemma’s gaze attentive, her slight, too-bony shoulders relaxing somewhat, so May decides to continue.

‘A long time ago. _Long_ time.’ One corner of May’s mouth creeps upwards as she remembers. ‘You know, when you start out, you spend more time down on the ice than you do actually skating.’ 

(And for all Jemma looks a little shocked at the subject matter – May doesn’t typically regale them with stories of her past, after all – she’s still listening raptly. May smiles.)

‘There were always… older kids, adults, sometimes even kids my age, and they’d be skating so perfectly. I’d get knocked down, over and over, but I just kept getting back up. Hurt like hell, but I didn’t want anyone to see that. I just wanted to be good. To do it on my own.’

The scissors glide along the edges of Jemma’s hair easily, casting away the split, imperfect endings. If only, May thinks, it was as simple to exorcise all of one’s demons like this. 

‘I was second year, I think, at the Academy, and I went down in a sparring session. Hard. Physio checked me out, said I’d need surgery on one of my knees.’

Recognition sparks behind Jemma’s eyes, and May feels an absurd twinge of pride – this is the girl, after all, who’d had their medical histories memorised within a week of joining the Bus team. The fact that she’s aware of this surgery, even after all of this time and pain… it’s nothing short of miraculous.

It’s nothing short of Jemma Simmons.

‘It was damaged from falling over on the ice so much,’ she murmurs. ‘And I thought about it, and I could almost pick out four or five times where I could have done the damage. Some hits… sometimes you just go down harder. But I never stayed down, even those times. Even when I should have.’ 

May has stopped cutting now. There are tears welling up in Jemma’s eyes, but she’s still listening. Her eyes lock onto May’s in the mirror, and May only hesitates slightly before pushing through her doubt, resting her hands on Jemma’s shoulders.

‘Getting back up… it’s admirable. It’s natural to want to stand on your own feet again. But you don’t have to push it.’ Her eyes are fierce; she _needs_ Jemma to get this. ‘You stay down on that ice as long as you need to. You get yourself _right_.’

Jemma’s gaze clings to hers like a lifeline. 

‘You understand?’

Lips trembling, eyes teary, Jemma nods.

Shifting her gaze to her own reflection, Jemma runs her fingertips over her eyebrows with something akin to wonder – she must have just cleaned them up, May thinks – until the fingers of her right hand falter upon the gash above her brow. Her eyes scan over it in the mirror, and the intensity in her gaze, the borderline accusation she’s directing at herself, makes May want to avert her own eyes.

But she won’t. She will bear witness to this, for as long as Jemma needs her to.

‘It’s going to scar,’ Jemma all but whispers.

May firms her lips. 

‘Yes.’

Jemma’s tracing her fingers over the scar now, top to bottom, mapping the rough track of it as though committing this new instance of cartography to memory. Eventually, she drops her hands to her lap, swallows hard.

‘But that’s… okay.’

(And May knows that she’s talking about more than just this gash.)

Stroking the hair back from Jemma’s face, May watches with a heavy heart as the girl’s eyes flutter shut and she leans into the touch. So starved of human contact, May thinks. So starved of love. 

If there is anything this girl deserves, it’s love.

She waits until Jemma’s eyes reluctantly draw open once more, meeting her gaze in the mirror again and holding it. 

‘It’s okay,’ May confirms. 

Jemma nods, just like that.

Because she trusts her. 

And really, that’s all Jemma has ever needed.

Finishing up with the last few strands, May places the scissors back on the countertop.

‘We can keep the bits at the front long, if you like. It’ll be easier to tie back.’

Jemma twitches her lips, grateful. ‘Do you have a…?’

May simply holds up a hair tie, a gentle smile at her lips. Jemma’s responding smile is tentative and shaky, but it looks more like a smile than anything she’s managed yet.

It’s progress. 

‘Shall I?’ May asks, gesturing at her rapidly drying hair. At Jemma's acquiescence, May combs it back into a loose, comfortable-looking ponytail, and she’s about to tie it up but… she hesitates. Dozens of images suddenly spring to mind of Jemma wearing her hair tied back – the hair pulled taut, not a hair out of place.

Oh, May realises. _Oh._

‘Tighter?’ she asks.

‘If you could.’

With new direction, May fashions her hair into something much more secure. She worries a little that she’s perhaps overdone it, but once she fastens the tie, Jemma’s shoulders relax ever-so-slightly. Running her hands over her head, Jemma ensures there are no tendrils out of place. May thinks she gets it, now.

Control.

She gets it. 

Standing up, Jemma takes the towel off her shoulders and shakes them out a little, and May thinks she looks, well. She looks gaunt, really. Having her hair pulled back off her face highlights just how angular her features have become, revealing the pallor of skin that has not seen Earth’s sun in too long. Her pants, at least, fit a little most snugly now, but she still wears Bobbi’s over-large hoodie. It dwarfs her, makes her look small and fragile in a way it wouldn’t have before her ordeal. 

But there’s something else too, now. Something more hardened, more determined. Something behind her gaze that’s distinctly _Jemma_ , and it hadn’t been there earlier. 

 _Fight_ , May realises. And not the sort of animalistic response they’ve seen triggered all day, either.

It’s Jemma Simmons fight. 

_Well. How about that?_

‘May?’ Jemma asks, sounding uncertain all of a sudden. ‘If… if I _do_ get to my feet and I can’t…’

_Oh._

‘I’ll be there,’ May replies, matter-of-factly. ‘And I won’t be the only one.’

She bites her lip briefly, gaze dropping to the floor. ‘I don’t… I’m scared, of being alone. I don’t want to be alone.’

May's heart clenches at the brokenness in her voice, but it only solidifies her resolve.

‘You won’t be. I promise.’

And maybe Jemma doesn’t believe it completely just yet, or maybe she’s just unprepared to trust much from this early stage of recovery, but she makes eye contact and her lips twitch in some semblance of a smile.

It’s not much, but it'll last them. May will make sure of that.

Collecting her toiletries, Jemma’s almost to the door when May glances at her watch, noticing something.

‘Hey, Jemma?’ she calls out. Jemma turns around, worried, but she instantly relaxes at May’s expression. 

Because May is smiling. It's tired, perhaps, but it's uninhibited and it's completely genuine.

‘You made it through Day One.’

Something lights up behind her eyes.

‘I did,’ Jemma confirms softly. Then she nods, more firm. ‘I _did_.’

 _Yeah, you did._  

She turns to the door now, taking a deep breath in and blowing it back out through lips shaped into an O. Her shoulders roll a little, releasing some of the tension.

And then, Jemma Simmons opens the door to the outside world.

 

 

-

-

 

 

(The shiv remains on the bathroom floor, forgotten.)

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Title from 'Dare You To Move' by Switchfoot. The song that Lance is singing is, of course, 'Drops of Jupiter' by Train. My kingdom for him to sing this at Jemma at least once.
> 
> Thanks so much for reading!!


End file.
